Sure, he’s a charismatic rainbow child whose half-man, half-Muslim, half-unicorn heritage makes him a ringer for Jack Kennedy. But is Senator Barack Obama maybe too much of a pussy to pull off this election thing? Experts disagree! MORE »

ARNOLD ENDORSES McCAIN WHILE ARNOLD’S KENNEDY WIFE ENDORSES OBAMA: The rich really are different — they’re all insane! Schwarzenegger endorsed John McCain last week, after Rudy Giuliani dropped out in disgrace, and after Schwarzenegger weakly claimed he wouldn’t endorse anyone. But at a “surprise appearance” (with Oprah) in Los Angeles on Sunday, Arnold’s trophy-Kennedy wife Maria Shriver said she’s endorsing Barack Obama. WTF? Aren’t the various first couples supposed to at least pretend they’re on the same team? [New York Sun/Baltimore Sun]

The oldest and most important man — the “dean,” or “stern grampa,” might we say? — of the Democratic party, the Liberal who is somehow brothers with various political legends who died 900 years ago, TED KENNEDY, gave his big endorsement speech for Barry today at Washington’s American University. Caroline Kennedy, whose father was some sort of neat, pretty president in the 1960s — the one obsessed with putting humans on the moon by a certain time — joined Uncle Teddy to give a Hope speech as well. Congrats, Barry: you have officially become a Kennedy today. It would be wise to beef up your security.

After the jump, some clips of Ted and Caroline’s speeches. If Ted keeps getting this excited whenever he says “Change,” he may very well die. But isn’t death a Change in and of itself?

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Do you remember the swinging social scene of early-1960s Washington? So many parties with those fun-loving and oft-assassinated Kennedy boys! And then George W. Bush ruined it all when he was appointed president four decades later. That’s the gist of this six-hundred-page Vanity Fair recollection about the glamorous good old days of yesteryear, and it prompted one Washingtonian to pen the following recollection of the glamorous Clinton years.

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* Democrats plan to pass what bills they can in the first 100 hours of the new Congress. Other, more complex issues like Iraq, may not be finished in the first 100 days, nor in the life of this Administration, nor even perhaps in our lifetime on this planet. [WP]
* King Abdullah of Jordan tells George Stephanopoulos, “We’re juggling with the strong potential of three civil wars in the region.” [WP]
* Bipartisan commission today begins debating establishment of diplomatic initiatives with Iran and Syria. [NYT]
* Members of Congress from both parties lament the training standards of Iraqi military and police. [WP]
* President Bush don’t sleep here no more; he just deals with his “funk” over midterms by globetrotting and considering his legacy.[WP, NYT]
* Whither the New England Republican? [NYT]
* Newspaper whose readership is almost entirely Medicaid patients reports that state spending on Medicaid declines for the first time ever. [USAT]

• Names & Faces: “People expect that we can’t play, so we always exceed expectations,” says Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) of his band, the Second Amendments. [WP]
• Inside the Beltway: Madeleine Albright is writing two more books, including one aout her brooches. . . Ron Christie, aide to Bush and Cheney, is writing a book titled, “”Black in the White House.” [WT]
• Page Six: Mimi Fahnestock, infamous intern of John F. Kennedy, remarries. [NYP]

• Washington Whispers: Rolex watch given to John F. Kennedy from Marilyn Monroe is up for auction; its box includes poem, “And let me love or let me die!”. . . 81% in one poll can identify Roberts. . . Some Democrats irked by Clinton’s participation in Katrina aid. . . Chertoff has an evacuation plan for his family. . . DeLay has personal vow not to frown or whine. . . Margaret Spellings exercises to the Police, Chaka Khan, Stevie Wonder, and the Carpenters. . . Romney’s religious credibility questioned by “Christian leaders.” [USN&WR]
• Inside the Beltway: Bush “took a rare break from mopping up Hurricane Katrina and bid farewell to Prince Bandar“. . . Bork’s son hawks shirts that say, “Renominate Bork! He’s tanned, rested and ready.” [WT]
• Rush & Molloy: Chuck D raps about Katrina: “Son of a Bush, how you gonna trust that cat?/ To fix [bleep] when help is stuck in Iraq?” [NYDN]
• The Scoop: Al Sharpton acted as “eyes and ears” of PETA for New Orleans. [MSNBC]

So when is the bias-hunting Media Research Center gonna pop a cap in WP style writer Robin Givhan’s well-clad ass? Sure, she got all wriggly about Condi dominatrix duds, but not so long after she berates the Veep for wearing “the kind of attire one typically wears to operate a snow blower,” she declares that the Roberts family is dressed nice… a little too nice. Admittedly, we don’t know much about fashion (no white chaps after Labor Day, right?), but we had no idea that a Talmudic reading of “appropriate attire” could, in fact, discern attire so appropriate it becomes inappropriate:

Dressing appropriately is a somewhat selfless act. It’s not about catering to personal comfort….But the Roberts family went too far… In their attire, there was nothing too informal; there was nothing immodest. There was only the feeling that, in the desire to be appropriate and respectful of history, the children had been costumed in it.

It’s true, we heard their first choice were matching smocks sewn from Bancroft first editions. MORE »